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Rice Owls vs. No. 24 Texas Longhorns Week 1 Free Pick

On Saturday September 3, 2011 its the Rice Owls vs. Texas Longhorns. Odds have the Longhorns listed as 23-point favorites. The game’s total is set at 55. Here then is a preview, free pick plus the college football betting angle.

Rice vs Texas Free Week 1 College Football Pick + Betting Preview

Texas is coming off a disastrous season where they went 5-7 and did not play in a bowl game for the first time since…forever and face a Rice team that was 4-8, but has hope returning most of their starters and will use a new spread offense that may give the Longhorns’ defense nightmares.

Venue | Stadium: Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium, AUSTIN, TX
Time/Date: 8:00 PM ET, Saturday September 3, 2011
NCAA Odds From: Pinnacle
Moneyline: OFF
Spread (ATS): Texas -23
Over/Under: 55

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Rice Owls vs. No. 24 Texas Longhorns Preview

CFB lines have Texas as big 23-point favorites with a total of 55.

Last season these teams played at Rice and the Longhorns beat the Owls 34-17. These teams have played many times in the past and Texas has owned Rice at home going 48-1.

Rice QB Taylor McHargue went down with an injury last season and with him out the Owls only won 1 game and with him under center they were 3-1 including winning the last 2 games of the season. WR Vance McDonald is 6’5″ and WR Randy Kitchens is 6’3″ and these 2 may create match up problems for the Texas secondary.

RB Sam McGuffie returns for Rice and he rushed for 883 yards with 6 TD and also is a pass catching threat with 39 rec 384 yards and 3 TD last season.

The Rice defense does return 9 starters, but they are undersized up front and lack playmakers in the secondary, which had a grand total of 6 INT in 2010. Also, last season the Owls only had 14 sacks and gave up 38.5 points per game. One telling stat for the weak Owls defense is the face that in 2010 no player on the front 7 had more than 6 tackles for a loss.

Texas returns QB Garrett Gilbert, who has a lot of pressure to erase last season’s nightmare and he had more picks (17) than TD’s (10). He has a talented set of WR’s, but that talent has not meant big numbers and Mike Davis and Malcolm Williams may have breakout seasons. [soliloquy id=”82219″]

One player that has HUGE expectations is RB Malcolm Brown, who comes in as the most highly touted freshman RB for the Longhorns in some time. He and Cody Johnson (592 yards 6 TD last season) will team up in the backfield and may have a big game against a more than suspect Rice rushing defense.

The Texas defense was actually pretty good last season ranking 6th in the nation in opponents yards allowed. The front line D will be good at stopping the run and getting to the QB led by LB’s Keenan Robinson and Emmanuel Acho, but the pass defense is a big issue with losing 3 DB’s to the NFL in NFL defensive backs in Aaron Williams, Chykie Brown, and Curtis Brown. They have talent coming in, but they really will be tested in this game with Rice and their new spread offense.

Betting Trends

Rice is 0-4 ATS in their last 4 games as a road underdog and Texas is 1-4 ATS in their last 5 games as a home favorite, 1-6 ATS in their last 7 games as a favorite of 10.5 or greater, and has an Under record of 4-1 in their last 5 home games.
Rice is only 1-4 ATS in their last 5 games facing Texas.

The Longhorns are chomping at the bit to get back to national prominence and they will come out on fore in this game on both sides of the ball. Rice does have promise, but they will get killed in this game.

Pick: Texas -23 and the Over

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By Jason Green

Jason Green is back with Cappers Picks again to give out his free sports plays. As always he's hoping the Braves and Redskins can win a championship since their last one in the 90’s was long ago. He’s starting to know the pain of Cubs fans.